Containers Lost, Containers Found – A Lego Story About Portable Storage That You Never Knew…

Sadly, not all shipping containers can make their way to becoming houses, portable offices, or gardens. Vast waves can sometimes occur at sea and these lovely containers are thrown overboard, never to see daylight again. The contents of the containers are often thought to be a total loss, another addition to the red column on a company’s ledger book, and that was the case in 1997. When a freak wave struck a ship called the Tokio Express twenty miles off the coast of Cornwall, Britain, 62 containers were lost at sea. Most people thought that that would be the last time anyone would see the goods that were inside them, but that wasn’t the case.

One of those 62 containers contained over 5 million pieces of Legos. Yes, Legos. As the container sank to the bottom of the sea, the latch doors opened and it’s contents made their way into the sea. Roughly 20 miles away on a beach in Cornwall, England, beachgoers began finding thousands of bits and pieces of Lego sets that washed up on the beach. The funny thing was (as though Legos washing up on a beach wasn’t funny enough) that most of the Legos that washed ashore were nautically themed. People began finding seaweed, SCUBA flippers, octopuses, and lifeboats all across the Cornish shore. One resident, Tracey Williams, also reported “. . . stories of kids in the late 1990s having buckets of dragons on the beach, selling them.”

Over the last 17 years, the practice remains a popular pastime for residents and tourists alike. But, as you might imagine, the stock of Legos is beginning to run thin. “These days the holy grail is an octopus or a dragon,” says Williams. “I only know of three octopuses being found, and one was by me, in a cave in Challaborough.” Locals have since set up a Facebook page for the Legos called “Lego Lost at Sea,” where people can go and post pictures of their finds.

This is a sad fate for some, but not all, shipping containers. Most of them live out long, happy lives carrying cargo to and from far off, exotic destinations. After they get retired, don’t you want to honor their long life by continuing their use? Browse our selection of modification options, and see how you can make these containers work for you long after their shipping days are over.